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Alfa Romeo Brera

There is an American television programme called Beauty and the Geek. It pairs a beautiful but intellectually challenged woman with a smart but less than hunky man. The programme plays to preconceptions that beautiful people are stupid and geeks unattractive. In short, you cannot have it all.

Is the same true of cars? Are the cleverest cars the ugliest, and the prettiest cars dumb? Let's look at the Alfa Romeo Brera. Launched in March 2006 the Giorgetto Giugiaro-styled coupé is one of the best-looking cars money can buy.

There is a choice of three engines, two petrol and one diesel. The entry level 2.2 litre petrol produces 185bhp, while the larger 3.2 litre V6 delivers an impressive 260bhp. In daily use the 2.2 is probably best. Brisk rather than quick, it nonetheless has a free-revving nature that the 3.2 V6 - burdened by its all-wheel-drive system - never quite matches. If 30mpg